Football Serves as His Getaway and Showplace : USC: The toughest challenge for Oliver has been off the field, where he has faced family tragedy and difficult court trial.

Clinton Oliver is reluctant to brag about his big brother.

“Then I wouldn’t have any friends,” he said.

But if he were so inclined, the 10-year-old Clinton would have plenty to tell his fellow fifth-graders at Bakersfield’s Laurelglen Elementary School.

Clinton’s brother, Jason, is a starting cornerback at USC. He intercepted three passes last Saturday night in a nationally televised victory over Penn State.

The Pacific 10 Conference honored him Monday as its defensive player of the week.

Probably more important to Clinton, though, his brother provided a shoulder to cry on last fall when the brothers lost half of their immediate family, their mother dying of lung cancer and their father dying of AIDS complications within a one-month period.

So what went through Clinton’s mind as he watched on television while Jason ruined what was expected to be a showcase performance for Penn State and its Heisman Trophy hopeful, senior quarterback Tony Sacca?

“(It was) great,” he said.

And was he proud?

“Yes.”

Others might be more verbose in their descriptions of the sophomore from Bakersfield High, but they are no less amazed by the 19-year-old Oliver’s resiliency.

In the last year, Oliver has faced not only the deaths of his parents but also charges of battery and false imprisonment in the alleged sexual assault of a 23-year-old female graduate student at USC.

Oliver and two of his teammates, linebacker Willie McGinest and tailback Michael Jones, were acquitted of the charges in June.

The charges had been brought last Oct. 15, three days before the death of Marvin Oliver, the highest ranking black officer in the Kern County Sheriff’s Department, and 23 days after the death of Oliver’s mother, Juanda.

With the misdemeanor charges hanging over him, Oliver was left with more than his grief.

As executor of an estate that included a triplex and five houses, including the family home, that were about to go into foreclosure because of delinquent payments, Oliver was forced to deal with lawyers, realtors, creditors and funeral directors.

While some teammates fretted about playing time or problems with their girlfriends, Oliver faced the responsibility of finding a home for his little brother.

He was left to deal with questions and concerns he had never even considered: What to do with his parents’ personal effects? His father’s coin collection? The furniture in his family’s home?

He was left to wonder: Why hadn’t his father told his oldest son that he was dying?

“I felt like it all caved in at once,” Oliver said.

Marvin Oliver’s illness was diagnosed as AIDS six months before his death, the Bakersfield Californian reported last October. But he kept the information from his family. His sister, Lula Stewart, told the newspaper that she had no idea how he had contracted the disease.

Even with his world falling apart--he didn’t learn the cause of his father’s death until he read it in the newspaper--Oliver continued to attend class and play football, even excelling beyond expectations on the field.

He started for the first time two days after his father’s death. Two days later, he was at home in Bakersfield when a man from the credit union came to repossess his parents’ cars.

Oliver missed the Trojans’ next game to attend his father’s funeral, which all but overwhelmed him. After viewing his father’s body, he broke down and practically had to be carried out of the church. But he soon returned and started in the Trojans’ last four games.

Against Oregon State, he returned an interception 66 yards for a touchdown. Against UCLA, he returned one 34 yards for a score.

“When I was on the field, I got away from reality,” he said. “The emotion, the excitement, the fans and my teammates really got me away from it. When the game was over, of course, I’d have to deal with it. But during the game, I could get away.”

Once the season ended, though, he had nowhere to hide.

“That’s when I was tested, because I started to think about it a lot more,” he said.

As the days passed, Oliver started to accept his fate, even if he didn’t understand it.

“The first question that comes to mind every time I think about it is, ‘Why?’ ” he said. “I can’t answer it, so that’s when I get busy--or I sleep.”

Coach Larry Smith has provided counseling, helping to keep Oliver focused in the classroom and on the field. Pat Preston, his high school coach, helped Oliver find a probate attorney and still handles most of the paperwork that goes along with being executor of an estate. Preston mails documents to USC assistant Gary Bernardi, who makes sure Oliver signs them and then mails them back. Preston’s wife, Patty, pays the bills. Rick Van Horne, a deputy sheriff in Kern County, helps with real estate transactions.

The triplex and two of the houses have been sold. The family home has been cleared out, furniture sold and personal belongings put in storage, and is ready to be leased. Another of the houses is being rented. The other burned down. The empty lot is for sale.

His brother is living with a cousin, DeWayne Cheadle, who is married and has a young son.

Cheadle’s wife, Pat, said that Clinton has continued to earn A’s and B’s, despite the upheaval in his life, which included switching schools. He gets “really excited” whenever USC is playing on television, she said.

Clinton has yet to attend a game, but the Cheadles plan to take him Saturday when USC plays Arizona State at the Coliseum.

“He’s really proud of his brother,” DeWayne said.

Oliver received his best news on June 14, when a jury announced in Los Angeles Municipal Court that it had found him not guilty of the charges against him.

“That was probably one of the most intense moments I’ve ever (experienced),” he said. “To just sit there and not be able to say anything and have everything basically controlled by somebody else--it was pretty intense.”

At the time, Oliver said: “I learned that watching ‘People’s Court’ isn’t the same as this.”

The reading of the verdict brought relief, but also depression.

“Because my parents didn’t get to hear it,” Oliver said.

He thinks of them often.

“It doesn’t hurt quite as much but usually a memory will (trigger a response),” he said. “I don’t think about it near as much as I did before, but around Thanksgiving and Christmas, or birthdays--family times--then I’ll think about it.”

Mostly, though, he is able to concentrate on football.

“Finally,” he said.

He said that he has improved--”I’m a little more fundamentally sound”--but attributed his big game against Penn State to being in the right place at the right time. He almost had a fourth interception and came close to blocking three punts.

“I think it was just a matter of being opportunistic,” he said. “We were in a nickel defense, where I was playing on the hash(mark, as a fifth defensive back), playing off the quarterback and trying to read his eyes and jump on the routes.”

A receiver and safety at Bakersfield High, where he helped the Drillers to a 26-0 record in his last two seasons, Oliver “plays the ball very well and has a good sense of the ball,” Smith said. But he needs to improve against the run.

Listed in the media guide as being 5 feet 11 and weighing 190 pounds, Oliver is actually about 5-10 and 170 and would benefit from added strength, Smith said.

“He has a chance to be a great corner if he spends more time in the weight room,” Smith said.

Oliver doesn’t disagree.

“I need to get more physical and improve my tackling because I tend to dive instead of just going in and trying to hit people in the face,” he said.

Overall, Oliver seems to have made a remarkable adjustment to the changes in his life.

“He’s more resilient than I think I would be, especially at that age,” said Preston, his high school coach. “I don’t know if he’s resolved it all internally yet, but when he’s busy at school, he’s able to cope with it. The competition, going out on the field and playing, helps him let out his frustrations and anxieties.”

But at times, it still hurts.

It pained him after the Penn State game, for instance, that he couldn’t share his triumph with his parents. About an hour after the game, he said, he was asleep.

“Sometimes,” Oliver said, “I feel a little empty.”